Hengest

Yes all drives show up in the BIOS. I tried doing a repair install/recovery but my XP disk does not give the repair/recovery console options when booting from the disk. Apparently that is a feature of disks from some suppliers. I am feeling quite sure now with all of the tests I have done that this is going to be a software problem rather than hardware. In the absence of the recovery option I am thinking I will have to get a new HDD, do a clean install and then fit my old drive as a slave and transfer files over. Unless there are any other suggestions? Thank you :)

Hi, yes I tried waiting it out. Left it for an hour but the screen just stayed black with the flashing underscore. I was thinking that it could be a corrupt file but don't see wh that would have just caused the PC to shut down. Thanks

Hi, I have seen other threads with a similar title but all sem to have occured after the poster did something. By PC just rebooted itself while I was working and after the POST went to a black screen with a flashing underscore. I tried rebooting but got the same thing, never getting to the windows loading screen. System details are: Windows XP Home SP3 Dual core Pentium 3.2Ghz Asrock 4Core Dual VSTA Mobo 2 Gb OCZ Ram DDR2 (2 x 1Gb) 160 Gb Maxtor IDE drive Sapphire ATI Radeon X1650 PRO PCIE Graphics card On booting I get the POST screen and short beep as normal. I have done some things already so maybe I should list what has been done: Removed all peripherals, USB etc. Removed each stick of Ram Swapped IDE cable Removed HDD and tried as slave in another machine, works fine. Tested all PSU outputs, under load, with Fluke meter (all fine but grey wire showed 4.7v, is that low and would it matter?) Last week I had a malware issue which I worked through with a helper at Malwarebytes and everything was ok after that but I am wondering if this could actually be a software issue related to that problem. The thread at Malwarebytes is here if it helps: No explorer or admin permission after Microsoft Security Essentials Alert - Malwarebytes Forum I look forward to hearing from anyone who may be able to help. Thank you.